But she hadn’t had a faithful retainer. She’d had Typhani. Latest, I suspected, of a long line of Typhanis. And maybe a few Geniphers.
There was always Nate. Not my idea of a faithful retainer, but at least, according to the costumer, he’d known the QB since they were much younger.
Of course, much younger didn’t necessarily mean thirty years. But still—he’d been closer to her than anyone else I could think of.
And, I thought, glancing at the clock, he just might be in the green room, recuperating from his latest panel.
“I need to talk to Nate,” I said, and barely waited for Steele’s nod of acknowledgement before I raced away.
Nate was, indeed, on break, though I finally located him in the bar at the back of the supposedly closed restaurant. Not that he couldn’t have drunk his cup of coffee in the green room. He probably wanted to be left alone. Ah, well.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“I know the convention is important for fan relations,” he said, “but my heart’s just not in it right now.”
Okay, maybe I was wrong about no one mourning for the QB. I nodded and tried to look sympathetic.
“I really need to be on the phone, trying to get a sense of what’s happening back in California. Or back in my room, trying to come up with a coherent plan to save the show. What a disaster! And after everything we went through to make this thing a success.”
We. Okay, it wasn’t exactly deep mourning, but perhaps I’d finally found the one person at the convention who sincerely wished the QB alive again.
“You’d known each other a long time, hadn’t you?” I asked.
He nodded.
“More than thirty years,” he said.
Chapter 31
Yes! I thought, but I tried to stay calm and think of just the right thing to ask. If I wanted to be subtle, it was too soon to ask whether he’d been in love with her, or whether he knew anything about her buying the rights to Porfiria so soon before Ichabod Dilley’s untimely and downright suspicious death.
“What was she like?” I asked instead.
“I don’t know,” he said. “What’s anyone like when they’re young? Ambitious, impatient. Beautiful, of course. You have to be, to get anywhere in this business. And tough. I mean, I know a lot of people call her a bitch and a dragon, but that’s because they don’t understand what she had to go through to get where she is. You have to be tough.”
“And talented,” I suggested.
“Yeah, well,” he said, shrugging. “That’s not as important as you think. Not that she was untalented. But it’s not as if she ever pretended to be a great tragic actress or anything. Still, she could really have gone someplace, been much bigger if she’d only had the breaks.”
Just then we heard Maggie’s laugh, somewhere nearby. Nate smiled, involuntarily—the way most people seemed to when they heard her. Then he looked down at the table and sighed.
“Actually Maggie was the one who really should have gone someplace,” he said.
“Why didn’t she?” I asked.
“Who knows, with Hollywood?” he said. “She was good enough, and gorgeous enough, but maybe she didn’t want it enough. Or wasn’t mean enough. All I know is, I lost track of her for…I don’t know. Fifteen years? Maybe twenty. Then I got an invitation to this fund-raiser she was running, and I went, just for old time’s sake. And when I saw her, I thought, my God. She still had it. I thought it would be a great PR stunt, signing her for the show: old friends getting together to bring to life the long-neglected work of their dead buddy.”
“Oh, they were friends of Ichabod Dilley? Maggie and the QB?”
“They all worked on the same movie,” Nate said, shrugging. “I don’t know about friends, but they probably met, one time or another. And if they didn’t, what did it matter. It was just a PR stunt. Stupid idea.”
“Only problem is that word ‘long,’” I said. “As in ‘long in the tooth.’”
“Yeah, stupid me for not realizing that,” Nate said. “I was surprised when she hired Maggie anyway. And then, first week on the set, I realized why. Gave her the perfect excuse to make life miserable for someone she never liked. I was surprised Maggie stuck it out as long as she did.”
“Stuck it out? I thought the QB fired Maggie.”
“Yeah, she did, finally,” Nate said. “Soon as she figured out how much the fans loved Maggie. Or maybe realized how much better Maggie looked on camera. You ask me, Maggie was probably relieved that the battle was over, and she could go home to her animals again.”